Latest Articles

Sir Richard to the Rescue?

Virgin founder Branson offers $25 million atmosphere-scrubbing prize Virgin mogul Sir Richard Branson is dangling $25 million for anyone who can figure out how to scrub vast amounts of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. The Virgin Earth Challenge — which Branson announced today with the ubiquitous Al Gore by his side and which we’re pretty […]

Can greed get us out?

Billionaire Richard Branson will announce today in London a prize of $25 million to the inventor of a device that effectively reduces greenhouse gas concentrations. Although the participants are under a media embargo, American climatologist James Hansen -- who will serve as a judge of the potential inventions, along with English scientist James Lovelock and Australian author Tim Flannery -- did discuss the topic of geoengineering a solution to global warming this week in front of a large crowd at U.C. Santa Barbara, as part of a lecture he gave on the dangers of human-caused climate change.

Good as usual

Elizabeth Kolbert’s latest piece in the New Yorker discusses the IPCC report and the political shift underway as the science debate dies down and the policy debate heats up. She says more or less the same things I said in my latest Tom Paine piece, only more elegantly and, you know, to about five bazillion […]

The question is, what kind of geoengineering?

Gwynne Dyer writes of James Lovelock:

If we overwhelm the natural systems that keep the climate stable, Lovelock predicted, then we would "wake up one morning to find that [we] had the permanent lifelong job of planetary maintenance engineer ... The ceaseless intricate task of keeping all the global cycles in balance would be ours. Then at last we should be riding that strange contraption, the 'spaceship Earth', and whatever tamed and domesticated biosphere remained would indeed be our 'life support system'."

I have a nasty feeling that we are almost there.

So do I.

Bush administration put on the defensive over climate change

After six years of dodging the climate issue, the Bush administration is finally having to face it head on. They aren’t changing policy — don’t be silly! — but they are changing rhetoric. Bush is changing his climate talk, but not his walk. Photo: Whitehouse.gov Over the past month, climate change has become impossible for […]

A visual history of the industry

Avast, me hearties! Seems the landlubbers ’round here have it in for me column. But I refuse to Arrr. I. P. I’ve returned, peg-leg and all, with a quick post about the atlas resources on the fisheries pages of the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization. These maps illustrate tuna and billfish catches over time and […]

With eco-friendly earthen floors

I’m all for green building — especially when it involves eco-renovations that take into account more than just some CFL bulbs and a solar panel. But dirt floors? It’s a growing trend, according to a piece in the NYT yesterday. The “earthen floors” are primarily made of mud, but may also include other materials like […]

Vermont congressman walks the talk

Vermont Rep. Peter Welch (D) has announced that both of his offices — one on Capitol Hill and one back in his home state — will be going carbon neutral. Welch will offset 56 tons of carbon each year — the amount generated by fuel and electricity use in his two offices and travel for […]

Pro skateboarder Bob Burnquist ramps up his green work

Bob Burnquist at the X Games XI, where he took the gold medal for Skateboard Vert Best Trick. Photo: Jason Merritt/WireImage Bob Burnquist isn’t afraid of taking risks. In fact, he’s made a career out of it. The 30-year-old pro skateboarder is a 12-time medal-winner at the X Games, has developed and named a number […]

Links

There was some hot-and-heavy debate about carbon offsets on Gristmill last week. I assume that debate will only get more intense as offsets and "carbon neutrality" move into the mainstream. Here are a few semi-related links relevant to the debate: Sun Microsystems’ enviro blog has a detailed, thoughtful series going on carbon offsets: part one, […]